Jan. 27 - Old town Quito with random ¨Chicas¨ Susy picked up

According to my Ecuadorian Mother (Susy), today was supposed to be a relaxing day. I slept in and took it easy in the morning as I had been told the altitude would kill you if you took things too hard, and it's true. I managed to get winded just standing in the kitchen talking to Susy (that could also be because she still hasn't figured out I don't speak Spanish and is talking even faster today).

Somehow I managed to figure out, after Susy said the same thing 10 times, that we were going to have breakfast and then go downtown to vist the old city; in particular La Ronda.

Breakfast was my first introduction to Ecuadorian food. It consisted of some bread with "Queso de la mesa"(the house cheese - the cheese version of house wine), fried eggs, "tomate del arbol" juice (I've never seen the fruit before, but the juice was homemade of course) and the finest coffee available in Ecuador .... Nescafe instant coffee. While breakfast was being prepared Susy managed to find out I liked honey, so I was given some and let me tell you - even the honey is different down here. Slightly bitter.

After I cleared the table we headed out on the town. I'm only allowed to set and clear the table....don't worry Mom, I'm going to keep trying to do more things. Susy won't even accept how I make my bed and redoes it when I'm not looking. I should remind you that I have no idea where the house is located and haven't had time to look at the map, so I'm completely at Susy's mercy.

Let me tell you, the buses here are very interesting to say the least. On some you pay when you get on, on others when you get off, and some won't let you off unless you can show a ticket to say you paid. Some buses are city run, others are private, and as far as I can see there's no way to tell which is which. The doors never close and a guy hangs out calling out the route. Since the doors are always open, if you don't get off fast enough you have to jump. To top it off, half the bus stops don't have anything to indicate it's a bus stop (one was even in the middle of the intersection). As for the routes, I can't figure them out. Susy told me at one stop, two weeks ago the traffic went in the other direction. It's hopeless.

If that doesn't sound like enough of an adventure, Susy can change create one. She appeared to know everyone and told them all that she was taking this Canadian around town (I forgot to mention, she had been told I was American and once she found out I was Canadian her attitude towards me changed .... she even started speaking English to me). She got in an argument with a complete stranger about which mountain the teleferiQo (gondola ride) was on. It turns out this "argument" was actually a friendly discussion, but to an outsider all conversations here look like arguments.

Somehow, through all this commotion, Susy managed to pick up four girls from Chile. They ended up being our travel companions for the rest of the afternoon. (Quick side note, any single guys out there who need a good wing man, I'll give you Susy's number).

So armed with my lifeline (aka Susy) and my four Chicas, we wandered around the old town. La Ronda was the first stop. It is a beautiful street lined with Colonial buildings (typical of this area) some as many as 500 years old. On the walls in between small shops and restaurants are tiles of famous Ecuadorians. When we reached the top of the street, between breaths, I managed to ask Susy what the statue was at the top of the hill. Without skipping a beat she wisked all of us into a cab (5 women in the back and me in the front) and off we went to the top of the hill.

La Virgen de Quito is a magnificent statue perched atop the hill where she can watch over Quito. From there you can see the entire city, including the 22 churches in the old city. It is a wonderful place to see how Quito is oriented. To the west are three mountains with smaller mountains to the east. Quito stretches for 22km within this 4km wide valley. It is very long and narrow. While up on the hill, we were entertained by some indigenous children who performed some traditional dances for everyone by the statue.

Once back in the old city we had lunch on la Ronda in a small restaurant before continuing our trek through the streets, stopping in the Plaza Santo Domingo and Plaza San Francisco to watch the performers, enjoy the architecture and fight off children trying to shine our shoes (and my hiking boots). One of the most remarkable stops was La Comanñia de Jesus, Ecuador's most ornate church, and the most beautiful church I have ever seen. Legend has it that 7 tons of gold were used to decorate the walls, and you can tell when you are inside. It is as if someone went in and turned the entire church to gold.

We parted ways with my Chicas in the Plaza Grande, home of the President and numerous daily gatherings of the people (mostly protests). Once home, while Susy made dinner, I took a shower. Simple enough, right? You forget that I'm the one taking the shower. There was absolutely no hot water and very little water pressure, I'm talking drops here, the kind that drive you nuts in the middle of the night. Every now and then I would get a 10 sec burst of water, which would disappear for a few minutes. After 20 minutes I was finaly finished. Being who I am I did't say anything - after all you put toilet paper in the waste bin here, not down the toilet - so this water problem must be normal and I'll adapt.

Well it turns out electricity is very expensive, so Susy heats up the water for an hour before you have a shower. Being the nice person Susy is, she turned the water off so it would heat up for my shower and forgot to turn it on again. Obviously she had a great laugh at this Canadian who showers with no hot water and told everyone for the next couple of days. I'm sure it doesn't surprise anyone at home to find out that within the first 24 hours, I have become Ecuador's newest joke. You can now go into any bar in Quito and hear "Did you hear the joke about this Canadian....."